Atmosphere
by Taylor Jenkins Reid
Summary
Joan Goodwin has been obsessed with the stars for as long as she can remember. Thoughtful and reserved, Joan is content with her life as a professor of physics and astronomy at Rice University and as aunt to her precocious niece, Frances. That is, until she comes across an advertisement seeking the first women scientists to join NASA’s space shuttle program. Suddenly, Joan burns to be one of the few people to go to space.
Selected from a pool of thousands of applicants in the summer of 1980, Joan begins training at Houston’s Johnson Space Center, alongside an exceptional group of fellow candidates: Top Gun pilot Hank Redmond and scientist John Griffin, who are kind and easygoing even when the stakes are highest; mission specialist Lydia Danes, who has worked too hard to play nice; warmhearted Donna Fitzgerald, who is navigating her own secrets; and Vanessa Ford, the magnetic and mysterious aeronautical engineer, who can fix any engine and fly any plane.
As the new astronauts become unlikely friends and prepare for their first flights, Joan finds a passion and a love she never imagined. In this new light, Joan begins to question everything she thinks she knows about her place in the observable universe.
Then, in December of 1984, on mission STS-LR9, it all changed in an instant.
Fast-paced, thrilling, and emotional, Atmosphere is Taylor Jenkins Reid at her best: transporting readers to iconic times and places, creating complex protagonists, and telling a passionate and soaring story about the transformative power of love—this time among the stars.
GoodReads Winner for Favorite Historical Fiction 2025, and Nominee for Favorite Audiobook 2025
My Review
Taylor Jenkins Reid just may not be the author for me. I know I’m likely in the minority here, but I was hugely disappointed by this book. There is a lot of strong language, open-door spice scenes between a lesbian couple, and a heavy dose of feminist commentary that felt more preachy than empowering. The messaging became repetitive and off-putting to the point that it actively pulled me out of the story. I listened to the audiobook and genuinely enjoyed all three narrators, but even their performances could not save this story for me.
My biggest issue is that the central focus of the story is a sapphic romance. Nowhere in the book description or marketing did this become clear. I personally choose not to read these types of romances, and had I known going in, I would not have picked this book up at all. Because of that, I felt blindsided and misled as a reader. That experience alone makes me hesitant to trust future marketing around this author’s work.
I went into this expecting a story centered on women breaking barriers in the 1980s space program, with themes of strength and perseverance. While the book technically touches on that, it is not the heart of the story in the way I was hoping. I wanted meaningful women’s empowerment woven into the narrative, not constant, heavy-handed commentary that felt more like a lecture than storytelling.
The space elements were also a letdown. For a book marketed around women in the space program, there was surprisingly little actual time spent on space. When the story did dive into it, the scientific explanations were overly detailed and tedious. It felt like the author tried to cram all of her research into the story, which made parts of the book read more like a science textbook than a novel. I did not need to know how every mechanism worked. I wanted a compelling plot and layered character development, and this book failed to deliver either.
The dual timeline structure did not work for me here. I did not connect with Joan as a character at all. She came across as passive and one-dimensional, someone who allowed people to walk all over her without much growth or depth. The family drama with her sister, Barbara, felt unnecessary and uninteresting, and the relationship between Joan and her niece Franny crossed into uncomfortable territory for me. That entire side plot felt awkward and out of place, and it added nothing meaningful to the overall story.
Overall, I found this book deeply boring. I kept listening to the audiobook, hoping something would click, but it never did. I am genuinely disappointed because I wanted to love this story, especially given how hyped it is. Unfortunately, this ended up being one of the most frustrating reads of my year (2025). I cannot recommend it.